Make conditional disable symbols easier to access

[Mads]

If you have disable symbols that switches code into debug or demo mode etc....it is critical that you know about them, and see what they are currently set to.

Conditional disable symbols are too hidden; to see what they are and edit them you need to right click the project, select properties, and then select the symbols option from the properties window...

Idea 1: Put them in a folder in the project list instead and allow the user to edit their value directly in the project window.

Idea 2: In addition all symbols should have a setting that says what their value should be in a built application, this could be settable either by double-clicking the symbol in the symbol folder, or by showing the two values directly in the project window in two separate editable columns.

This would also eliminate the need for this related idea.

PS. The suggested symbols folder has another related idea - namely the idea for an equivalent to "DEFINE" in C. Definitions could be a folder much like the proposed symbols folder, or they could be merged.

[crelf]

Putting them in a container in the project list?  I like that idea...

[Mads]

Yes, some sort of container...I used the term "Folder"...but they could make a different glyph and container concept...like they have now with other things in the project list:-)

[silmaril]

I strongly disagree with the statement that this idea would eliminate the need for being able to set CDS in the build spec.

You could have several build specs with different sets of symbols in one project.

But the idea of having them inside folders in the project hierachy is great!

I'd like to recommend having several named sets of symbols in the project.

The user should be able to switch from one set of symbols to another in the development environment.

It should also be possible to define which set should be used for a certain build spec.

This would meet all the needs we have in our current project. At the moment we are using half a dozen different project files with the same source codes, which is not very straight forward.

[TCPlomp]

I agree with silmaril, it doesn't eliminate the Build setting because I can define a 'Debug' build, a full feature build and a trial build.

But we need better approachable diagram disable structures.

Ton

[Mads]

You are absolutely right Silmaril. I should have written "could"...as they are not conflicting ideas - as you so elegantly show by combining them in your comment. Instead of just a "folder" of symbols we could make symbol sets in that folder ...and the builder could have an option to use one of the available sets. By doing it this way you automatically have access to sets that you have made during development and can refer to those instead of making a new one for each build spec (although it would probably be nice to be able to access and edit them directly while editing the buidl script too):-)